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Culture War Roundup for the week of May 4, 2026

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The welfare state and ghetto culture are the mechanism. That doesn't explain why blacks are drawn to it more so than other races.

If race is skin deep and the sociological theory being presented is true then it should apply equally regardless of race. But instead we see very disparate results along racial lines. It's the same problem lefty sociological theories have. As soon as you treat them as serious theories and not convenient verbal political excuses that have no substance and only exist to help us turn our brain off, they fall apart.

That doesn't explain why blacks are drawn to it more so than other races.

The origin of the American federal welfare state traces its way back to the Freedman's Bureau, established during the Civil War. As you might guess from the name, blacks were "drawn to it" because the Bureau was specifically established for them.

A sociological theory that hangs it all on "IQ" and doesn't account for the facts of the historical case is less fixing the problems with lefty sociological theories and more embracing them, just swapping out "IQ" for "racism" as the Great Monocausal Foe.

I think some people assume that accomplishing this swap will lead to closing the welfare state tap off, perhaps unaware or forgetting that the tap was turned on at a time when (functionally) that very belief was widespread.

To take your narrative seriously one would have to imagine that a post-war government program that lasted 9 years in the 1860's which gave resources and education to a group of people was always going to lead to that people being welfare dependent. If that's not the argument, then we're just finding historical a-ha! moments that might feel satisfying to our brains but are of no real consequence or value beyond that.

Both the left and the conservatives assert that the gaps exist because of historical circumstance and/or oppression. They both assert historical just so stories without ever applying them seriously as sociological theories about the nature of man. Instead treating it like a verbal game, not a look at reality. They walk through the steps of history and pontificate on each as a cause for behavior, but not a consequence of it.

The 'monocausal' foe is the nature of human beings, the differences between them, the widely divergent population groups humanity is composed of and the wide variety of circumstance they find themselves in.

If history was causal in the way you describe and not consequential, one would see a vast difference between ancestrally similar population groups that had divergent historical paths. We have this case.

Iceland was the poorest country in Europe for centuries. Yet with the Marshall Aid program post-WW2, they went from being the poorest to being one of the most prosperous nations on the planet in the span of 50 years. The lesson is simple. Give high quality people technology and resources and they will prosper. Being colonized doesn't matter. Being poor doesn't matter.

Becoming a criminal or welfare dependent is not a consequence of history. It's the path of least resistance for a certain type of person. Most people find it easier to learn how to read than to have 5 children with 5 different men, collect child support, become obese and claim medical benefits on top of that. Most people find it easier to go to work rather than rob a liquor store and sell drugs. Most. But not all. The difference is the people.

The circumstance that make those anti-social actions possible are a consequence of the kind of people that would take advantage of those circumstances existing. On top of that, welfare programs existing doesn't cause, for example, Norwegians in Norway to abuse the programs at nearly the same rates as other groups do. In short, these history specific explanations fail to explain anything in a broader context. They're not applicable to the real world. These things happen in different context and the obvious determining factor is the humans, not their historical circumstance.

To take your narrative seriously one would have to imagine that a post-war government program that lasted 9 years in the 1860's which gave resources and education to a group of people was always going to lead to that people being welfare dependent.

In the conservative narrative you are trying to identify (not necessarily my narrative), the Freeman's Bureau would just be the start of a much more persistent and long-running government-led effort specifically designed to target black Americans (and other minority groups) with various types of benefits.

The 'monocausal' foe is the nature of human beings, the differences between them, the widely divergent population groups humanity is composed of and the wide variety of circumstance they find themselves in.

If you hung out around conservative Americans long enough you would hear some of them say something along these lines, perhaps with fewer five dollar words.

Most people find it easier to learn how to read than to have 5 children with 5 different men, collect child support, become obese and claim medical benefits on top of that.

In the United States, African-American out-of-wedlock births have increased dramatically since World War Two. This is despite the fact that measured African-American IQ scores have also increased over the same period of time. Why?

In the conservative narrative you are trying to identify (not necessarily my narrative), the Freeman's Bureau would just be the start of a much more persistent and long-running government-led effort specifically designed to target black Americans (and other minority groups) with various types of benefits.

Yeah, that's generally how those narratives go. A string of just so stories and a-ha! moments that don't hold water when we have to explain the same pattern existing elsewhere.

If you hung out around conservative Americans long enough you would hear some of them say something along these lines, perhaps with fewer five dollar words.

Paleo-cons got kicked out of the mainstream a long time ago. Peter Brimelow did a nice interview on the topic on Tucker Carlson's show recently. Which was a nice, albeit a bit late, surprise.

In the United States, African-American out-of-wedlock births have increased dramatically since World War Two. This is despite the fact that measured African-American IQ scores have also increased over the same period of time. Why?

Why indeed. Are either of these things relevant or related? Out of wedlock births in Iceland are the norm and happen at almost the exact same rate as out of wedlock births for AA's. Yet they have none of their problems. You are going to have to clarify what the point is here.

Paleo-cons got kicked out of the mainstream a long time ago.

Lots of people who probably don't know what a paleo-con is still vote R and can express similar sentiment.

Are either of these things relevant or related?

Yes, out of wedlock births are an anti-social behavior that correlates with bad childhood outcomes (at least in the US of A).

Out of wedlock births in Iceland are the norm and happen at almost the exact same rate as out of wedlock births for AA's.

In Iceland, though, this only translates to about a quarter of children being raised in single-parent homes - quite possibly, the parents being married in all-but-name, you're right that it doesn't cause significant problems. It's something like twice the rate among African-Americans - which, relevantly to my point, has risen since the 1960s. Why has this negative behavior among African Americans risen with their IQ score?

And we can ask the same question about violent crime: what's the HBD explanation for why African-American crime rose massively in the 1960s even as they grew more prosperous (in the 1940s, when African-Americans were poorer, crime was much lower)?